Adventure eBook

“Perhaps I have been hasty,” she admitted.
“You see, I am intolerant of restraint.
If you only knew how I have been compelled to fight
for my freedom. It is a sore point with me,
this being told what I am to do or not do by you self-constituted
lords of creation.-Viaburi I You stop along kitchen.
No bring ’m Noa Noah.—­And now, Mr.
Sheldon, what am I to do? You don’t want
me here, and there doesn’t seem to be any place
for me to go.”

“That is unfair. Your being wrecked here
has been a godsend to me. I was very lonely
and very sick. I really am not certain whether
or not I should have pulled through had you not happened
along. But that is not the point. Personally,
purely selfishly personally, I should be sorry to
see you go. But I am not considering myself.
I am considering you. It—­it is hardly
the proper thing, you know. If I were married—­if
there were some woman of your own race here—­but
as it is—­”

She threw up her hands in mock despair.

“I cannot follow you,” she said.
“In one breath you tell me I must go, and in
the next breath you tell me there is no place to go
and that you will not permit me to go. What
is a poor girl to do?”

“That’s the trouble,” he said helplessly.

“And the situation annoys you.”

“Only for your sake.”

“Then let me save your feelings by telling you
that it does not annoy me at all—­except
for the row you are making about it. I never
allow what can’t be changed to annoy me.
There is no use in fighting the inevitable.
Here is the situation. You are here. I
am here. I can’t go elsewhere, by your
own account. You certainly can’t go elsewhere
and leave me here alone with a whole plantation and
two hundred woolly cannibals on my hands. Therefore
you stay, and I stay. It is very simple.
Also, it is adventure. And furthermore, you
needn’t worry for yourself. I am not matrimonially
inclined. I came to the Solomons for a plantation,
not a husband.”

Sheldon flushed, but remained silent.

“I know what you are thinking,” she laughed
gaily. “That if I were a man you’d
wring my neck for me. And I deserve it, too.
I’m so sorry. I ought not to keep on
hurting your feelings.”

“I’m afraid I rather invite it,”
he said, relieved by the signs of the tempest subsiding.

“I have it,” she announced. “Lend
me a gang of your boys for to-day. I’ll
build a grass house for myself over in the far corner
of the compound—­on piles, of course.
I can move in to-night. I’ll be comfortable
and safe. The Tahitians can keep an anchor watch
just as aboard ship. And then I’ll study
cocoanut planting. In return, I’ll run
the kitchen end of your household and give you some
decent food to eat. And finally, I won’t
listen to any of your protests. I know all that
you are going to say and offer—­your giving
the bungalow up to me and building a grass house for
yourself. And I won’t have it. You
may as well consider everything settled. On
the other hand, if you don’t agree, I will go
across the river, beyond your jurisdiction, and build
a village for myself and my sailors, whom I shall
send in the whale-boat to Guvutu for provisions.
And now I want you to teach me billiards.”